Like I’ve said before, outside of the FISA bull, the only issue that really riles me up is religion, and this one almost had me screaming at my laptop. So there’s this atheist soldier, right? Can’t imagine that’s too uncommon (despite the constant bleating of “no atheists in foxholes”). The funny part? The Army methodically destroyed his life because of it.
Two years ago on Thanksgiving Day, after refusing to pray at his table, Hall said he was told to go sit somewhere else. In another incident, when he was nearly killed during an attack on his Humvee, he said another soldier asked him, “Do you believe in Jesus now?”
Hall isn’t seeking compensation in his lawsuit — just the guarantee of religious freedom in the military. Eventually, Hall was sent home early from Iraq and later returned to Fort Riley in Junction City, Kansas, to complete his tour of duty.
He also said he missed out on promotions because he is an atheist.
“I was told because I can’t put my personal beliefs aside and pray with troops I wouldn’t make a good leader,” Hall said.
This is so infuriating it hurts. Seriously, that last sentence is so illogical my brain started to eat itself.
I’m not going to write a long tirade on why this is stupid, I’ll just say this. Imagine, if you will, one single case where a group within the United States happened to be populated mostly by atheists. Somehow this one business or sports team or community police force was made up of atheists. Now imagine that one of the members of that group were to convert to Christianity, and went through that kind of treatment.
Just think about the absolute frenzy if a Christian soldier was told to “put aside personal beliefs and quit praying in front of the other troops”. We’d never hear the end of it as the right-wing pundits flailed, talking about the radical militant atheists oppressing good Christians. This? No big deal.
